**Wrigleys Essential Employment Guide** – The Disciplinary Process

How do you conduct a disciplinary hearing?

In this series of articles, Wrigleys' employment team explores the disciplinary process, offering guidance on key steps for employers.

In this article, we look at key considerations around how to conduct a disciplinary hearing.

By the time a hearing has been organised, the employer will have determined that there is a misconduct case to answer.

The purpose of the hearing is to allow all of the available evidence to be weighed in order to reach a fair and reasonable decision.Employers also need to take care with how the hearing is conducted to ensure the hearing itself is fair.

The burden of proof for upholding allegations at a disciplinary hearing is on the balance of probabilities - in other words, it only has to be more likely than not that the allegation is true - and it is at the hearing where the employer decides whether or not that burden of proof is met.